John Durham

Technology, Strategy

John Durham is Managing General Partner of Catalyst (www.catalystsf.com) – a strategy firm for digital start-ups and early funding companies.

A true industry veteran, most recently Durham served as the executive vice president, business strategy at Carat Fusion, for Carat's offices across the country including New York, Boston, San Francisco, Chicago and Los Angeles.

Before that, he was a founder of Pericles Communication, a political digital firm that helped advocacy and political groups tap into interactive marketing. Durham handled the online advertising strategy for five candidates, including the President and four Senate races, and all five won.

Prior to the launch of Pericles, in 2003, Durham had been Chief Operating Officer of Interep Interactive which, under his direction, became the largest independent online ad sales company in the United States, and through co-marketing agreements, the largest internet rep company in the world. When Winstar Interactive was part of Winstar Communications, Durham joined in March of 1998 as Vice President of advertising sales. In 2000, Durham helped engineer the acquisition of Winstar Interactive Media by Interep Interactive, a unit of Interep (NASDAQ: IREP), one of the nation’s largest radio rep firms.

Durham, a long-time resident of San Francisco, has been teaching advertising and marketing classes since 1992 and currently teaches advertising in the MBA program at the University of San Francisco. He also founded the Bay Area Interactive Group, an internet industry-networking group.

Highlights: Managing General Partner of Catalyst; Former Executive Vice President of Business Strategy at Carat Fusion; Former President of Pericles Communication, a political digital firm